Fiat chief Sergio Marchionne wants to build Apple car

The chief of Fiat Chrysler Automobiles NV and chairman of Ferrari, Sergio Marchionne, maintains tech firms venturing into the automobile sector would do well to partner with established players considering the complexity of car manufacturing. He believes Apple should consider his company when building their cars.

"I would assume that we have the credibility to be one of the players they have looked at. There are parts of us that would be interesting for them," said Marchionne, while addressing the media on 2 March at the Geneva International Motor Show.

Marchionne, who calls himself an "Apple freak," says he owns every product that Apple has made, and is very keen to build a car for the smartphone maker.

"Apple has a language, and you have to be able to speak that language. Usually, the industry comes into that dialogue with a high degree of arrogance as we know how to make cars. That's not very helpful as their syntax is worth more than our ability to build cars," he was quoted as saying by Bloomberg.

The chief of the Italian-American automotive firm had earlier commented on the disruption firms such as Apple and Google were bringing into the auto sector with the concept of driverless cars or assisted driving. He had even urged traditional motor firms to keep an eye on these tech firms saying it would be foolish to ignore the moves of Google and Apple into car technology.

Apple is reportedly working on an electric car under Project Titan and has hired over hundred employees for the project. The Cupertino-based smartphone giant is in conversation with BMW to explore ways to build the vehicle. Google, on the other hand, is already running test drives of its autonomous cars in California and other cities. Another giant, Tesla, has been building electric and semi-autonomous hatchbacks, sedans and even luxury cars.

In May 2015, Marchionne met Apple CEO Tim Cook and Tesla chief Elon Musk in California to discuss avenues of future collaboration with regard to their autonomous vehicles.